Sunday, February 11, 2007

Around the Horn; A Round-Up of O's News

The Best of the Blog-O's-phere, Feb. 5 - Feb. 11

It’s not quite time to fly south, and the weather’s awfully chilly in Charm City. Nevertheless, Birds bloggers are still hard at work this off-season. Grab a coat and join Roar from 34 for a trip around the Blog-O’s-phere for the week of Feb. 5 – 11.

Perhaps the biggest story this week was the death of former O’s manager Hank Bauer. Camden Chat featured a tribute to the man who led the Orioles to their first World Series championship.

“Bauer's run as manager of the Orioles is, of course, one of the keys to why theteam was perhaps the best in all of major organized sports for many years. Hisfirst two teams turned in third-place finishes, going 97-65 and 94-68. And thencame the 1966 Baltimore Orioles.”

Other tributes came in from Baseball Crank (“Yes, out of respect for Bauer I haven't even called them the Hated Yankees, for once. Anything and everything that was ever good about the Yankees was true of Hank Bauer”) and non-baseball blogger SteveAudio shares a photo of his Hank Bauer model baseball glove.

Finally, the “former Orioles fan” at Swing and a Miss offers his personal memories of Bauer.

“Today I learned another figure from the Orioles of my youth had passed away. ..I not only recalled the thrill of watching that youthful Orioles team featuringBrooks Robinson, Jim Palmer, Dave McNally, Barber, Paul Blair, Boog Powell,Davey Johnson and newly arrived veteran Frank Robinson among others, I had theopportunity to meet the manager himself in my capacity as sports editor of myhigh school newspaper.”

In other O’s news, Jim Flanagan and Jim Duquette visited Baltimore’s ESPN Zone this week for a chat with fans. The Sun’s Roch Kubatko remarks on his blog about the low attendance at the event before acknowledging that he didn’t make it there himself.

“The duo of Flanagan and Duqette were optimistic about the Orioles this seasonand how they will fare; however, they were realistic with what the team is upagainst, especially in the American League East. The two men were honest in thesense that the team is trying to recover from almost a decade of losing, andchange may not happen immediately – but the team is improving.”

Later in the week, Baltimore Reporter visited the Sports Legends museum for another baseball-related event, this one a birthday celebration for Babe Ruth, and says some hometown favorites made the event worthwhile.

We’ll wrap up this week’s Blog-O’s-phere trip by taking a swing out to the West Coast where the weather’s warmer and Blue Notes, a Dodger blog, interviews former Orioles executive Logan White, who says that then-GM Roland Hemond “was very influential” in his career.

4 comments:

I can personally attest to everything said about Sports Legends and the Geppi museum. Everyone should check that place out. It's well worth the small cost of admission.

As for backing off the Yankee hatred out of respect for Bauer...I understand that as well. In my blog I didn't even mention that he was once with the Yankees. I just pretended like his entire career was his few years in Baltimore. (Those years were the most important anyway)

Thanks for the comment. It's always good to hear from members of the Birds blogging community.

Sports Legends is a great place. It seems like it hasn't caught on with the public, though, which is a real shame. Peter Schmuck referenced the relatively low gate in a recent column.

One amusing aspect of the Legends museum is that the O's recent history section is sponsored by Peter Angelos. Next time you're there, check out the glass-more-than-half-full wording on those displays. A continuing losing streak never sounded so good.

For other readers, here's the link to the Oriole Magic posting about Bauer.

Second, if no one come down to the games, it grossly cuts back on the potential customers for the museum. And that's a shame because it's big enough to be worth the money but small enough to get downtown after work in time to see everything in the museum and still be in your see by the first pitch.